Forget Checkout Queues: This Amazon Go Like Retail Store in Kochi Lets You Shop And Leave

Shoppers can simply shop and leave in India's first AI-powered automated retail store by Watasale.

Updated on: September 11, 2018, 12:39 PM IST

News18.com

Within a year of Amazon coming up with the first-of-its-kind retail store in Seattle by the name of Amazon Go, an Indian startup seems to have brought the concept to India. To recall, the Amazon Go store enables customers to walk in, pick their choice of items and leave. The corresponding amount is credited from the shoppers' Amazon Go smartphone app account. The store relies on cameras and weight sensors to figure out the items picked by the shoppers.

Now, Watasale, an Indian startup has successfully brought the concept to India in the country's first cashier-less fully autonomous retail store in Kochi, Kerala. The store is powered by Artificial Intelligence and hence, sans any cashiers or salespersons. This essentially means that shoppers will not have to wait in long queues for checkout. The processor works similar to Amazon Go, i.e. just shop and leave.

A concept by Nayasale Retail Pvt. Ltd., the unconventional retail store uses a Watasale app to provide a hassle-free shopping experience to users. As per Rajesh Malamal, chief marketing officer of Watasale, the store has been in the making for the past three years, requiring extensive expertise in artificial intelligence and deep learning to make it work.

While the entire walk in - pick up - leave shopping concept is not new, with the likes of Amazon and Jack Ma's Alibaba having setup working examples of it, the idea is nonetheless disruptive to the traditional brick-and-mortar retail store. With India now being one of the very few countries to house such a store, the idea can only be expected to spread to other locations with time.